Bill Lancaster says he is known around Hobart, Oklahoma for thinking outside the box. As Sheriff of the Kiowa County Sheriff’s Department (KCSD), he has never been scared to grab people’s attention.

So when a friend of his who works at the ABLE (Alcoholic Beverage Laws Enforcement) Commission came to Lancaster with a unique way to fight drugs in his community, he jumped at it.

The idea was to run an ad in the area newspapers asking drug dealers if they had problems with competition. If so, the ad urges the dealers to contact the KCSD and authorities will help get rid of the competition for them for free.

Basically, the idea is to get dealers to snitch on each other.

“What intrigued me to it is that it’s different,” Lancaster said. “It’s not usual. It’s not your usual 1-800 crime stoppers that everybody knows. Every now and then you have to change your game plan up a little bit to get a little wow factor in there, if that makes sense. To catch somebody’s attention. A little outside the box.”

The ad prompts area drug dealers to fill out a questionnaire regarding their competitors and submit it in anonymously. An identical advertisement was run by the McIntosh County (Georgia) Sheriff in the Darien News in July. 

KCSD’s $60 ad first ran in the Hobart Democrat-Chief Nov. 4. According to Lancaster, his office has already had a handful of people turn in the questionnaire and several more either call his office or respond via Facebook.

While Lancaster is pleased with the responses, he says some of the calls and social media postings are from area citizens who have spotted possible crimes taking place in their respective neighborhoods.

“Like anything, it’s the idea of being anonymous. If you tell someone they are going to be anonymous and then they are not, they are not going to help you,” Lancaster said. “So if somebody brings one in to drop off at the Sheriff’s office, I don’t want our staff doing anything. They drop it off, walk out the door. Don’t ask them a question. That builds trust between our sheriff’s office and our community.”

According to Lancaster, he has also received a few complaints that this tactic can be used cause problems for residents who have nothing to do with the drug activity in the area. Regardless, the Sheriff points out that no matter what type of information is given to his office, they still have to investigate.

“We take the information that we’re going to get, we’re going to investigate it to determine if it’s valid,” Lancaster said. “If there is some meat and potatoes there, then we will move forward from there.”

Kiowa County, which is located in the Southwest part of Oklahoma, has a population of just under 10,000. According to the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation, of the counties 79 total arrests in 2013, 24 were drug related. 

Because the community has such a small population, Lancaster doesn’t believe the county has a major drug problem.

“I don’t believe here in Kiowa County, Oklahoma that we have major drug problem,” Lancaster said. “On the other hand, I’m not a fool to think there’s not drugs in our community. If you have any drugs in your community, it’s a problem. And we must do what we have to do, within the boundaries of the law, to remove those drugs from our community.”